Transferring your domain name without downtime sounds simple: you request a transfer code and set it up with a new provider. In practice, however, much more often depends on a domain name. Your website, business email, forms, calendar invitations, and sometimes even external systems can depend on it. Therefore, an incorrect setting or a step in the wrong order can mean that customers cannot see your website or that important email temporarily fails to arrive.
The solution is not to carry out a move as quickly as possible, but to prepare for it properly. With the right inventory and a controlled transition, you can significantly reduce the risk of interruptions.
Why a domain transfer sometimes causes problems
A domain name is primarily the address by which people and systems find your company. The actual services behind it are not always hosted by the same party. For example, your website might run on a separate hosting server , while Microsoft 365 handles your email and an external party sends your newsletter.
The links to those services are stored in DNS records. Think of DNS as the roadmap behind your domain name. It specifies, among other things, where your website can be found and which mail server is authorized to receive email for your domain. If you only transfer the domain registration and all DNS settings remain intact, visitors often won't notice anything. However, if you transfer the DNS zone, hosting, or email simultaneously, a careful approach is required.
It is precisely this distinction that is quite often missed. A domain name may have been transferred, but if the new DNS zone is incomplete, certain components still will not work. The homepage might appear fine, while contact forms, subdomains, or email do not function properly.
Transferring a domain name without downtime starts with an inventory
Before requesting a transfer code, it must be clear what is linked to the domain. Do not do this based on assumptions or an old email from your previous provider. Check the current DNS zone and, if in doubt, inquire which services are actually using the domain.
In any case, check the website and any subdomains, such as webshop.yourdomain.nl or portal.yourdomain.nl. Also check where the email is hosted and which records are required for this. For Microsoft 365, for example, these are MX, SPF, DKIM, and authentication records. Do you use an external accounting package, CRM system, newsletter service, or telephony platform? Then DNS records may exist for those as well.
Create a complete overview of all settings. An export or screenshot of the current DNS zone is helpful, but also check the content line by line. A single character error in a mail record is enough to disrupt email traffic.
Pay extra attention to these parts
When transferring a business domain, these aspects deserve particular attention:
- A-records and AAAA-records for your website or application
- CNAME records for subdomains and external services
- MX records for incoming email
- SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records for reliable email delivery
- TXT records for authentication of Microsoft 365, Google services, or other platforms
- Any SRV records, for example for telephony or specific applications
If you do not have a clear overview of these records, do not start the move. This is precisely the moment when guidance can save time and unnecessary stress.
Choose first: move only the domain or the services as well?
The least risky situation is an administrative transfer. In this case, only the management of the domain name moves to a new registrar, while your nameservers and DNS zone remain the same. Technically, the website and email continue to function as they did before.
That is a good choice if you primarily want a single point of contact, are looking for better support, or want to host your domains with a party that also manages your hosting and IT. However, do consider where the DNS zone should be located in the long term. If it remains with an old provider, you may remain dependent on that party for changes.
If you also want to move the hosting, DNS, and email, a phased transition is wiser. Fully set up the new environment first and test it before actually switching the DNS. This requires a bit more preparation, but prevents you from having to figure out settings during the move.
Lower the TTL well before the change
DNS records have a TTL, which indicates how long systems are allowed to remember a DNS response. If this is set to 24 hours, a change may take another day to manifest for some visitors or mail servers. This makes a transition less predictable.
Therefore, preferably lower the TTL of the relevant records 24 to 48 hours before modifying the DNS. A value of 300 seconds, or five minutes, is often used during a planned migration. As a result, systems pick up changes faster.
Do not wait until just before you move to a new location to apply the TTL. The old TTL will remain active in caches that previously requested the record. After the transition, you can increase the TTL back to a normal value. This prevents an excessive number of DNS requests without losing flexibility.
Build and test the new environment in advance
If you are also moving the website, first prepare a copy on the new hosting environment. Do not just check if the homepage opens, but also test forms, logging in, the webshop, images, redirects, and any connections with other systems. A website that is technically online is not automatically ready for business.
The same applies to email. Set up mailboxes, aliases, and security settings in advance. When switching to Microsoft 365 or another mail environment, you must also take into account existing mailbox content, calendars, and shared mailboxes. The DNS change is only one part of the transition.
Preferably, test the new website using a temporary test environment or a local hosts file. This allows you to view the new server under your own domain name without visitors being redirected to that server yet. This is a practical way to detect errors before they become visible to customers.
Plan the transition moment consciously
A move without downtime does not mean you have to carry out everything in the middle of a busy workday. Choose a time when your organization is easily reachable and someone is available who knows which checks are required. For a webshop, this might be outside peak hours. For an office with a lot of email traffic, it is wise not to switch just before an important round of quotes or invoices.
Ensure that you have access to both the old and the new management environment for the duration of the transition. Do not cancel old services immediately. Keep the old hosting and email environment active for a while until you have verified that all DNS changes have been propagated everywhere and everything is working correctly.
The actual domain transfer can take time, depending on the extension and the parties involved. For .nl domains, this is often quick, but do not base your planning solely on that. Technical continuity is primarily determined by your DNS and service settings, not by the administrative transfer status alone.
Check more than just your website after the move
After switching, check if the website is accessible via the main domain and frequently used subdomains. Then, send email from an external address to your business address and send a message yourself to an external address. This way, you test both incoming and outgoing email.
Additionally, check your contact form, any order confirmations, and emails sent from your website or applications. These automated messages, in particular, are sometimes not noticed until days later, even though they are particularly important to customers.
Take into account differences between networks due to DNS caching during the first 24 to 48 hours. If you receive a report from a client that a page is not opening, this does not immediately mean that the entire migration has gone wrong. However, do investigate immediately which DNS information that network uses and whether the correct records are available everywhere.
Common mistakes during a domain transfer
The most common mistake is canceling the old hosting before the new environment has been tested. Another mistake is overwriting the entire DNS zone without including all existing records. This can lead to a working website, but non-working email or links.
Changing nameservers and email settings simultaneously also makes troubleshooting difficult. Preferably, change as little as possible at the same time, unless you have a well-tested migration plan. That way, if something goes wrong, you will know where to look more quickly.
Finally, a transfer code is not a license to skip all security checks. Verify who the domain holder is, whether the contact details are correct, and whether a domain lock is active. Carefully safeguard access to the management accounts, as a domain name is an important business asset.
When you have it better supervised
If you only have a simple website and no business email under the domain, you can often perform a migration yourself. However, as soon as multiple services, mailboxes, employees, or external connections are involved, it is wise to have the transition checked by a party that understands domains, hosting, and workstations.
Cloudformatie can map out such a migration in advance and execute the steps in the correct order. This prevents you from having to figure out during a busy workday why email isn't arriving or a form is no longer sending messages.
A domain transfer doesn't have to be a stressful moment. If you know which services are linked to your domain, test the new environment beforehand, and only stop old services after a thorough check, you keep your company's accessibility under control.